City Hall (1996)

(Credit IMDb) A young boy dies from a stray bullet during a shootout between a cop and mob family member who had previously been suspiciously given probation, only to break its terms. New York's Deputy Mayor, Kevin Calhoun starts digging for information.It isn't very often that I shut a movie off at 45 minutes in. Especially with a terrific cast like this one. This movie was so boring that I was unable to pay attention. It was extremely talky and failed to engage my interest. A movie with Al Pacino, John Cusack, and Bridget Fonda should not be this boring, plain and simple. Maybe I will give it another try down the road, but I doubt it.

Harold Becker directed this political drama that stars Al Pacino as New York City Mayor John Pappas, who must deal with the aftermath of an accidental shooting involving a young boy that threatens his party's re-election chances. John Cusack is deputy mayor Kevin Calhoun, who launches his own investigation into the matter, and is shocked to find scandal and corruption that threatens to ruin his reverence and respect for his boss, who is an eloquent speaker, but since when does that equal virtue and honesty? Danny Aiello, Bridget Fonda, & Martin Landau round out a fine cast, which is really the best thing about this marginal film that never quite reaches the heights of profound revelatory drama it aspires to, coming up short in the end.

Working from a script written in part by Nicholas Pileggi, best known for writing the book Wiseguy, which he adapted into the movie Goodfellas, and for writing the book and screenplay Casino, director Harold Becker shows how connected circles scratch each other's backs, even in the command of a comparatively honorable mayor like Pappas, who is regarded as a presidential prospect. As Cusack follows the paper trail of the dead mobster's probation report, his skepticism is agitated. How did this violent young man get probation rather than a jail sentence? We meet the other players in the plot, not the least of which is Danny Aiello, the political boss of Brooklyn, and Tony Franciosa, the Mafia boss whose nephew was shot dead. How and why these people are affiliated I leave to the movie to divulge, though there are never any misgivings that they are.The narrative is told generally through the eyes of the Cusack character, a visionary from Louisiana who admires his boss and hopes to learn from him. Much is made by everyone of bureaucratic knowledge passed down through the generations. Some of the dialogue is ungracefully erudite, but considering I just described the building blocks of the story as bureaucratic knowledge, one can't say it doesn't work. The shooting case builds against the seasoning of two other issues on the mayor's desk: a charge by Aiello for a subway stop and an off-ramp in Brooklyn to aid a new banking center, and the city's bid for the next Democratic convention. Individual idiosyncrasies are also explored, including Aiello's emotional bond with the music of Rogers and Hammerstein.Much also is made of menschkeit, a Yiddish expression, which, Pappas explains to his deputy, is about the bond of honor between two men, about what happens between the two hands in a handshake. This connection doesn't mean much to Bridget Fonda, the lawyer for the policeman's association who defends the dead cop's honor and fights for his widow's pension even as incriminating evidence appears. Little by little, the deputy mayor comes to grasp that menschkeit is such an influential notion that it outclasses he law.There are various scenes of hard impact, including one where the Brooklyn boss comes home for lunch in the middle of the day, his wife asserts her interest through the medium of the dish she has cooked, and then the Mafia boss drops in by surprise. There is also a compelling, and markedly conjectural, late scene between the mayor and his deputy.One scene handled with delicacy is comprised of the mayor's decision to speak at the funeral of the slain child, in a Harlem church. His advisers tell him he won't be wanted there. But he goes anyway, and cranks himself up for a spiel of unabashed hyperbole, Pacino and his character both.It gets an impressive reaction from the congregation, but the mayor knows, and his deputy knows, that it was artificial, and the way they scrupulously evade discussing it, in the limousine taking them away, is a subtle employment of composure and innuendo. This is a script that knows it has to supply Pacino with the reason why most of his fans go to see him, and immediately follows its quota with the reality that silence has much more inherent meaning than speech.Pacino and Cusack are convincing together throughout the movie, the older man unbreakable and aware, the younger one anxious to learn, but with ideals that don't sway. Pacino is innate with his down-to-earth capacity to marry common sense and inventive imagination, inspired flair and matter-of-fact realism. Cusack moves very freely in spite of his dark defensiveness.The Bridget Fonda subplot development is unnecessary, but it is a result of veteran screenwriter Paul Schrader's otherwise shrewdly perceptive belief in the worth of every character, and each is fleshed into earnest embodiments. Aiello, for instance, is a highlight because he evokes his character's joie de vivre and sensitivity to his environment.

Across the country and especially in the political landscape, people with any kind of political ambition, should take time out to see this film. The movie is called " City Hall " and with little imagination, its synopsis can take place anywhere in America. It just so happens to open in New York. Here we have the story of a popular politician named Mayor John Pappas (Al Pacino) with enough savvy to run a major metropolitan city with very little effort. His right-hand man is none other than Deputy Mayor Kevin Calhoun (John Cusack) an equally bright individual who's ambitions are tied to his mentor and both seemed destined for higher office. Everything points in that direction, until a police shooting ignites an investigation spearheaded by Marybeth Cogan (Bridget Fonda) who believes the guilt points towards city hall and the mayor. A six year old boy and a police officer's death are blamed on a career criminal who's questionable freedom leads to an apparent cover-up by political pay-offs and city corruption involving union leaders like Danny Aiello played by Frank Anselmo, corrupt judicial officials like Judge Walter Stern. (Martin Landau) and mafia bosses like Paul Zapatti (Anthony Franciosa) who are deeply involved. Also implicated, are party officials like Larry Schwartz (Richard Schiff) who works for the probation office of New York. But it is the bond between the mayor and his deputy which is taken to task by the accidental shooting. A great vehicle for Cusack and a sure bet nominee to become a classic. ****